Mafioso: Destroy Rumors

Get delegates to quash the rumor

If the rumor proves to be persistent and it begins to impact your rapport with colleagues, you need to put a few trusted delegates to work. At this stage of the game, let’s assume that your back is against the wall and you have very few sympathizers who buy your side of the story. In this case, you may have to plant a few positive rumors about yourself.

Now, if you happen to be Eliot Spitzer and have always been a judgmental son of a b*tch, the persuasion game may not work so well. However, if you have a fairly straight past to lean on, your friends can help clear your name by reminding people that they have no reason to exercise harsh judgment against you. Remember, the majority of people will recall their most immediate association, so if you can shoehorn a few good deeds into the mix, it will take some of the heat off the detrimental rumor. If, on the other hand, the tidal wave of momentum against you is too strong, you may have to stand up and address the rumor.

Put it out in the open (but don’t whine)

Although the time may come when you are forced to put the rumor out in the open and acknowledge it, it is futile (not to mention pathetic) to start whining about the harm it is doing to your reputation. In other words, don’t bother screaming slander and tossing around threats of a lawsuit. After all, if you’ve tried every avenue to destroy rumors and they’re still doggedly pursuing you, chances are pretty good that you’ve contributed to it in some way; and although you may hold a grudge against the rat who brought it to light, no single person is responsible for the way a rumor infiltrates a social circle.

For these reasons, your last resort if you want to destroy rumors is to be like Bill Clinton and admit some degree of guilt. If you choose this course of action, it is good to remember that despite his impeachment, Bill Clinton has emerged in the collective consensus as a hero and a pretty good president who just happened to diddle the intern. ________________________________________________ Mr. Mafioso answers your e-mail ________________________________________________Greetings Mr. M.,

I like your advice as it is practical, no-nonsense and valuable. You are giving the service of a real education to young men who may not have had a good, manly and high-character man [in their lives] (by manly, I mean a man without [being] a stupid macho type).

The above brings me to the subject/question of this e-mail: As part of my personal journey into being the kind of person I want to be, I realize that many men in the world today were raised by their mothers to be nice little boys. This may have happened because [the] father may not have been around or because men have, over the years, been emasculated into being grown up nice little boys inside men's bodies. It is as if the testosterone has been taken out of males today and instead men have received injections of political correctness bullsh*t.

Question: Will you do a weekly column or web site in which you impart your wisdom on helping boys (no matter what age) become mature, functional, worthy adult men? The world is in bad need of a service like this.

VR

Dear VR,

I hate to break it to you, but you sound like a man who’s either taking the piss or standing with both feet in the closet. Aside from your endless repetition of the word ”man,” the suggestion that today’s men have been emasculated as a result of growing up with mom seems like a deeply personal issue rather than a sociocultural problem.

If you ask me, the problems men face after growing up with a single parent may have to do with maturity, but only occasionally do such men lack virility. In fact, a lot of men who grew up with mom have a much bigger chip on their shoulder than men who’ve grown up in the bland stability of suburbia and its malls. In my books, when men compensate for the absent father, they usually overcompensate.

Lastly, I will say that political correctness may seem like hogwash, but men need to stop blaming political correctness and the rise of its tenets for their failures. For centuries, in Western culture, white men had the privilege of being “the man” without having to earn it. And the way I see it, in most cases, men who feel emasculated should just get over themselves and stop blaming others for their own shortcomings. We may all look for scapegoats, but the virtue of today’s world is that things are rooted in healthy competition.

Finally, to address your question about a website, I see no reason to have a website or a blog. There are already too many of both. Stata Buon, Mr. Mafioso